Archive for February, 2005
To mod or not to mod
Computer games and the modding community go together like journalists and alcohol, so it’s rather alarming to see that a games firm is suing “hackers” who modified their legally purchased games. The Reg report notes:
The lawsuit claims the ninjahacker.net users decompiled the code to several Tecmo titles, including Ninja Gaiden, Dead or Alive 3, and Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball, and figured out how to create their own “skins” that change the appearance of game characters. They swapped modding techniques and hundreds of custom skins over the website message board.
The defendants are not accused of pirating the games, and the modifications and methods at issue appear no different than those employed by hobbyists on other video games - from Halo to the Sims 2 –for years. But according to the lawsuit, Tecmo suffers in the practice anyway.
…the company is seeking $1,000 to $100,000 in damages for every custom skin swapped over the website.
So you want to be a novelist?
Fancy becoming an author? Then don’t give up the day job. BoingBoing links to this survey of novelists’ advances, and it’s clear that writing books is hardly a licence to print money:
The range was from $0-$40,000 for an advance on a first novel.
The average was $6363.
The median advance is $5000. The median figure is a better indicator of what most people consider ‘average.’
“Don’t rent your music… own it”
That’s the message from MP3Tunes, the latest wheeze from Michael Robertson (the man who founded MP3.com). From the blurb:
MP3tunes differs from other online music services such as Apple’s iTunes and Microsoft’s MSN Music Store because it does not use digital restrictions management (DRM) technology, which restricts how a buyer can use the music. DRM restrictions limit what software or computer can be used to listen to the music and also limit what types of portable players will work. Songs in the open MP3 format, like those found at www.mp3tunes.com , are the most flexible for consumers because the songs work with a wide array of software players such as iTunes and Windows Media Player and are also compatible with virtually all digital players or computers, including the iPod series.
So it’s a DRM-free iTunes that works on iPods and Creatives alike, which can’t be a bad thing. Don’t expect to find the EMI or Sony catalogue on the site, but if you like the indier side of things then it’s well worth a look.
Don’t forget Warp Records’ Bleep.com either. In many cases the MP3s were ripped by the artists themselves…
I have the internet in my pants
No, really. I do. And when I say “pants”, I don’t mean “pants” in an American “I know they’re trousers, but I’ll call them pants” way*. I mean pants, as in underpants. Although when I say “the internet”, I mean “a web address”.
No, not a dodgy web address. The manufacturer’s web site.
I have to admit, I’m confused by this. I understand manufacturers’ need to get their web address onto every conceivable surface, but to embroider a URL into your pants? Fair enough if it were on the outside of the pants - while it’s not a look I go for myself, I understand that The Kids prefer to wear jeans that expose their pants to a cold, cruel world - but it isn’t. The URL is printed on the inside of the pants, not the outside. And to make sure that I don’t miss it, it’s repeated all the way around the inside of the waistband.
What I’m trying to understand here is why the manufacturer felt the need to put its URL inside my pants (and presumably - although I haven’t researched this - inside the pants of all their other customers). Is it promotion? Then they’ve put it in a silly place, because the only time someone other than the owner of said pants is likely to see the URL is in an intimate moment, and if that’s the case the last thing you want them to be thinking about is a web site full of pants - or worse, for them to interrupt proceedings to go and look at a web site full of pants.
Is it as a reminder? “Ooh, I’ve put on weight, I need to buy bigger pants - but I don’t know where to go! Ooh! Wait a minute!”
Is it for more information? “I’m really enjoying these pants, but I feel that I could enjoy them more. If only I could find out about the manufacturing process and the exact make-up of the fibres!”
Or is it to make me feel sexy? “I have a URL in my pants and I feel slinky!”
Probably not. I suspect that, like many things in the modern world, the manufacturer has embroidered its URL in my pants because it thinks that if you don’t have a web address, you might as well not exist - and it’s hidden the URL because nobody in their right mind wants pants with a sodding great hyperlink printed on them. So in one fell swoop the firm has created not just pants, but e-pants; and as we all know, e-anything is better than the old, dull, non-internet version.
They aren’t just pants, then; they’re techno-pants - and that means my buttocks are living in the future.
* This confuses me too. If Americans’ trousers are pants, what do you call pants? Clearly you can’t call them pants, because then people would think you were talking about trousers, not pants. I suppose you could call them shorts, but if you do, then what name do you use for shorts? Thinking about this is giving me a headache.
Fun with spam
As ever, the denizens of MetaFilter continue to find some strange and wonderful things on the web. Today’s pick is Spamusement, which offers “Poorly-drawn cartoons inspired by actual spam subject lines”.
Spam: you ain’t heard nothing yet
Things we know are true:
* Spam now accounts for between 60% and 90% of all email.
* Spamming is popular because it’s easy and very, very cheap.
* In the near future, more and more of us will use Voice over IP (ie, internet telephony) for our phone calls.
* Spamming people’s VoIP systems is likely to be easy and very, very cheap.
* Telephone and text message spam already exists, and is really bloody annoying.
* VoIP spam is likely to be cheaper to carry out than current forms of telephone spamming.
Therefore:
* We’re doomed.
According to Engadget, a new organisation called the VOIP Security Alliance believes that Spit - Spam over Internet Telephony - is a real threat. The article notes:
Since you use an IP address to route VoIP calls instead of (or in addition to) a regular phone number, there’s no technical reason why a voice spammer couldn’t barrage you with pre-recorded messages at virtually no cost to them, just like they do with regular spam. A company called Qovia has already created VoIP spamming software to prove it could be done.
And as we all know: when it comes to spamming, if it can be done, it will be done. Hurrah for technology.
One hand on the guitar
If you’ve ever been sitting in front of your computer and only half-listening to a phone call or family member, this excellent post should give you pause for thought.
is Gmail coming out of beta?
It certainly looks like it:
My wife is weeping with delight over my hardness and enlargement
This is just bizarre (warning, language may be unsafe for work): a Japanese adult English textbook titled “Porno smallbook speaking, let’s go!”
“Reverse masher… masheress?”
“Masher! Help!”
“What do you think you’re doing?”
Well, exactly.
[Via MetaFilter]
Colour me confused
Coloured wristbands help you show your support for / awareness of victims of various things, but what things?
[Via Anil Dash]